birth in feathers
by Perdue
Summary: then you remember that you'll never live to see another birthday, and you are stuck between gratefulness and misery. DaveJohn OS.


happy birthday dave

**Warnings: **jesus everloving christ everything i touch accidentally sadstuck this may or may not be the saddest thing i've written for this fandom

**Disclaimer: **mspandrew

**birth in feathers  
><strong>_-_

You are Dave Strider.

You are orange, and float, and have wings—well, wing, after what happened—but that doesn't change the fact that you are _Dave_.

It still hurts. _Can I talk to the real Dave_, he'd said.

God _damn_ for being the friendleader, the clever one who won't back down or accept defeat as an answer, he can be insufferably stupid. Stupid enough to prove that he's one of the only people in your life for whom you would sacrifice yourself. Given your feathery asshole state, you think he proved it pretty fucking well.

It's not just the bird thing, though. You're…

Christ, you're a game construct now. A fucking sprite. No matter what you do, no matter how much you help and how much you sacrifice, you aren't Alpha Dave, and you aren't going to get out. Whether your friends beat the game or destroy it, you're going to die once it's all over.

You should have fucking tried harder. Saved John's and Jade's lives, sure, but even though you know you're going to die, you let your Bro take the fall. You should have intervened, you should have died for him. If it weren't for you, he would probably still be alive. As if the death of your best friend didn't already haunt you enough, now here is the person who raised you from infancy pinned to the ground with a sword rammed through his chest. And you were fucking useless enough to let it happen.

How long had it been, you wonder? After finding John's broken body, after falling out of contact with Jade, how long had you and Rose played the goddamn game? How much time did you spend honing your skills, detached and determined to a level that was unhealthy, a level that you _knew_ was unhealthy, and yet you continued anyways. Maybe at some subconscious level you continued in that way _because_it was unhealthy. Somehow, you and your ectosibling were always much more prone to self-harm in the event of unshakably hopeless emotions.

You know that you have an ego the size of Texas state itself, and the irony of that never fails to amuse you, because you don't think there's anyone in your galaxy or any other that you hate more than yourself. Alpha Dave, king prick of asshole island. You know how he feels about John. You know because you're him. And yet he takes for granted the fact that you, one of his many doomed timeline selves, kept anything from ever happening. He's all buddy-buddy with the shitstain troll who got John killed in the first place, but it's okay, because now he can spend time with his best bro, and when they all get out of this mess, maybe they'll meet in real life, do all of the things that best bros do, and he will suppress his feelings the same way he was raised to do. You know he will, because if you were him, if you had the luxury of not having to live with John's death on your shoulders, that's exactly what you'd do. And you hate him for not having to carry that burden, not the way that you do.

Because if he knew what you knew, he would tell John right away and never look back.

Oddly it has never occurred to you to tell John yourself, but when you think about it, it isn't really your place. The John you love is dead, doomed just like you. And you'll never have him back. You can't fix everything.

You can't fix everything. Then you remember that you'll never live to see another birthday, and you are stuck between gratefulness and misery. You'll never make another mix, never share it with Jade and feel secretly embarrassed that hers are so much better, never learn more about the chemicals that preserve the dead things you find, never endure Rose's psychoanalysis, never take another photograph, never sit at your desk with your chin in your hands and stare at the screen as John rambles about how much he loves apocalyptic scenario movies.

It's strange to you. Despite the fact that you, Dave, were born more than thirteen years ago, prototyping yourself almost felt like rebirth, only this time you were conscious enough to feel it. It hurt, that birth in feathers. Jade might understand, the physical pain of self-prototyping. You hadn't known at the time that it would hurt, but you wouldn't do anything differently if it's what kept John alive.

Even if you'll never experience another birthday, you would never let John die on his own.


End file.
